Customer service training ideas work best when they change what people do after the session, not only what they remember during it. Majan Electricity Company in Oman found that traditional customer service programs had made little difference, so its leaders tried an active approach built around the FISH! Philosophy. The experience offers a useful lesson for utilities, call centers, and any team whose customers struggle with both staff interactions and complicated processes.
Why did Majan Electricity need a new approach?
The electricity sector in Oman had been privatized, and Majan Electricity needed a change in work culture to provide better and more efficient customer service. The team had already received traditional customer service training, but it had little effect. The company needed an “out of box approach” to energize staff and bring passion to work.
The need was especially clear at the front desks and the call center. Complaints about staff attitude were rising, and customers were facing complex procedures. At the same time, no new ideas were coming forward to address those problems. Training that only explained good service was not enough. The company needed staff to communicate differently and help improve the processes that customers found difficult.
What did Majan Electricity do?
Senior leadership believed that FISH! could be the solution. The company used tailor-made activities based on its challenges: two-way communication, asking questions, and increasing customer engagement.
The team used several additional exercises. Headbands demonstrated the power of asking questions. Digital technology supported play storming and stinky fish. The team was also asked to contribute ideas for improving two main processes.
The work connected the FISH! practices to the company’s real customer-service problems. Be There points to complete presence, including physical, mental, and emotional attention during an interaction. Choose Your Attitude asks people to notice and choose how they show up, including after a difficult conversation. Make Their Day turns an ordinary interaction into a meaningful moment by showing that another person matters. Play brings curiosity, energy, and creativity to work, while still respecting people and the boundaries of the workplace.
The team consisting of local Arab participants learned through fun and games about the importance of energy, passion, and commitment at work. The reported results were open communication, better customer experiences, and over 100 ideas each on the two challenges using Klaxoon during play.
Majan Electricity’s team learned through fun and games and reported more open communication and better customer experiences.
The team generated new ideas for improving the extension process and for simplifying processes overall to enhance customer service. Majan Electricity is one of many organizations whose results with the FISH! Philosophy have been documented, so its experience can be considered alongside other workplace examples.
What are good customer service training ideas when traditional training has not worked?
Start with the work people actually do. A lecture about empathy may sound useful, but a front-desk employee or call center agent also needs a chance to practice listening, asking questions, and responding to a real problem. If the session does not connect to the job, people may understand the message without changing their habits.
Adult learning guidance summarized by A. G. Palis and colleagues in “Adult Learning Principles and Presentation Pearls” says that adults learn more effectively when content is relevant, connected to prior experience, and supported by active participation and reflection. The guidance also describes the teacher’s role as a facilitator who helps learners apply ideas to practice rather than simply transmitting information. That approach gives customer service training a better chance of changing what employees do on the job.
That helps explain why active customer service training can be stronger than a standard presentation. Role-play scenarios let employees practice handling difficult customers, while listening exercises help them notice the difference between hearing words and being fully present. A short product-knowledge activity can ask staff to explain a service in plain language and answer a customer’s follow-up question.
Training games work best when they clarify the work. Headbands, for example, was used at Majan Electricity to demonstrate the power of asking questions. End with a short discussion: What did the activity reveal, and what will we try next?
Play, in the FISH! sense, brings curiosity, self-expression, and new ideas into the work while giving people room to test an idea, learn from it, and adjust without embarrassment. Be There keeps the activity respectful, while Make Their Day points attention toward the customer and the coworker. Choose Your Attitude helps people decide how they want to take part.
How can training change behavior after the session ends?
Training transfer is the bridge between learning and work. A 2018 study by J. Shen and colleagues, “How does training improve customer service quality? The roles of transfer of training and job satisfaction,” found that training affected customer service quality through transfer of training and job satisfaction. Perceived organizational support also changed how strongly training translated into transfer.
In plain language, people need both a useful lesson and a workplace that supports using it. A call center agent may learn to ask better questions, yet speed targets or supervisors who notice only errors can weaken the habit. The same problem appears at a front desk when a clear explanation cannot overcome a confusing process and employees have no way to suggest a fix.
To improve transfer, end each activity with one small work commitment. Ask employees which customer interaction will give them a chance to use the skill, then let them share what happened later. Leaders can model the practices themselves, especially Be There and Choose Your Attitude, so the training becomes part of the culture and continues beyond the session.
A clear explanation cannot fix a confusing system, so employees need a way to suggest improvements.
How can frontline staff help simplify frustrating processes?
Customer complaints can reveal weaknesses in the system as well as problems in an interaction. Employees who work at a front desk or answer a call center line often see where customers get confused. They hear repeated questions, notice unnecessary handoffs, and learn which parts of a process create anxiety, giving the organization clues about the root of a problem.
A U.S. government benchmarking report on complaint handling recommends using customer and employee input to design processes. It says strong complaint systems collect and analyze complaint information, improve core processes, and value frontline employees’ feedback. It also recommends empowering frontline staff to resolve complaints at the first contact when policy allows.
This is where training can become process improvement: give employees a structured way to identify what makes a difficult procedure hard, alongside practice in explaining it calmly. Choose one process at a time and ask where customers get stuck, what information is missing, which steps seem repeated, and what a simpler experience might look like. Keep ideas separate from decisions at first so people can explore possibilities before leaders evaluate them.
Majan Electricity used digital technology for play storming and stinky fish, then asked the team for ideas on two main processes. Using Klaxoon during play, the team produced over 100 ideas each on the two challenges. Other organizations can adapt the method by bringing the people closest to their own work into an active conversation about improvement.
A team can use a shared board, a simple form, or paper notes to gather ideas, including input from customer-facing employees and the people who support the process. Group similar suggestions and identify which ones can be tested safely. Play keeps the idea stage open, while Be There helps each contribution receive attention; Make Their Day keeps the customer’s experience in view, and Choose Your Attitude helps the group stay constructive when change is difficult.
What should a utility customer service training session include?
A useful session can combine several kinds of practice without becoming a long list of disconnected games. Begin with the customer problem the team is trying to solve, then give a short explanation of the service or process. Move quickly into a role-play for a difficult conversation, a listening exercise for attention and empathy, or a question-based game that helps staff uncover what the customer really needs.
Practicing better questions helps staff find what a customer actually needs.
Give employees time to work on the process behind the complaint as well. Invite them to explore improvements without requiring them to defend the current system, and use digital tools to make contributions visible when front-desk staff, call center agents, and managers may not speak equally in a room. Afterward, choose a small number of ideas for review or testing and name who will follow up.
Play does not need to shape every customer interaction. Utility customers may be worried about a bill or a process they cannot understand, so the customer-facing interaction still needs clarity, respect, and attention. Play belongs in the team’s problem solving.
What can other organizations learn from Majan Electricity?
The case shows that customer service training can address two problems at once. It can help employees build better habits for conversations, and it can create a channel for improving the procedures behind customer complaints. That combination matters in essential services, where a warm interaction helps but a confusing process can keep producing frustration.
A team does not need to copy Majan Electricity’s exact activities or claim the same results. It can begin with one recurring complaint, one short active exercise, and one question: What could the people closest to this work help us see? From there, leaders can listen, test ideas, recognize useful effort, and keep the conversation going.
Try the FISH! Philosophy with your team
If your customer service training needs more energy and more connection to daily work, invite your team to try the FISH! Philosophy upgraded trial. It gives a team 30 days of access to the FISH! film and its digital guides, so you can start putting ideas such as Be There, Choose Your Attitude, Make Their Day, and Play into practice while your team works on real customer needs.
Frequently Asked Questions
How can we make role-play feel useful instead of awkward?
Use situations your team actually faces, keep the scene short, and focus the debrief on what helped or blocked the conversation. The useful review looks at listening, questions, tone, and choices that can transfer to the job, rather than judging anyone’s acting.
Should customer service training cover product knowledge or soft skills first?
Teams need both. Product knowledge supports accurate answers, while listening, empathy, and clear communication help employees use that knowledge in a way customers can understand. Start with the customer problem and combine the two in practice.
How often should customer service training be refreshed?
Use short refreshers when a process changes, a recurring complaint appears, or employees need practice with a skill. Regular review keeps customer service training connected to the work instead of treating it as a one-time event.
How can managers support better call center training?
Managers can model the behaviors they want, make room for employees to use new skills, and recognize specific examples of good service. They can also review whether targets, scripts, or procedures make it harder for call center agents to listen and solve problems.
What should leaders measure after customer service training?
Measure the behavior the training was meant to change, such as clearer explanations, better questions, or more complete listening, along with customer feedback about the interaction. Pair those observations with process signals, because better service can depend on fixing the procedure behind the conversation.
